@boomerang,
boomerang wrote:For real?
Yeah, it wasn't too uncommon in that group (hell when they came back home form outside they'd pray against "hitchhiking spirits") and now that I think of it I had at least 4. The first was when I was about 5, I was into paper airplanes and tried to make a plastic airplane out of a triangular ruler in the middle of this very serious prayer meeting they were having. I was having a hard time bending it so I sat on it (everyone was on the floor speaking in tongues and the kids were fidgeting and trying to get past the hours and hours this went on) it snapped in the middle of them speaking in tongues which was a big downer on their whole spirit trip they had going on.
They decided that I was "out of the spirit" and while they didn't believe I could be possessed they believed that bad spirits could be "afflicting" me so they held an exorcism that night. I remember it as being very sweaty, with so many hands on me for so long and it was pretty hard to come up with some "tongues" that didn't sound ridiculous (it really did seem like a big joke they were playing on us with the tongues thing).
The second time wasn't long after and was a follow up to the first. I just wasn't "in the spirit" enough but I don't remember what made that one happen.
Then as a teenager I started stealing sweets from the pantry for a while and burying them in the woods around the house, I stole a lot more stuff so it wasn't as innocent as it can sound. I was getting bolder and bolder. I stole the next morning's breakfast corn bread out of the oven and hit the woods with it. I even stole a bunch of stuff out of the bus bringing home the groceries by tossing the stuff I wanted out to a friend.
I was stealing stuff all day every day around the house, stupid stuff like BBQ skewers that served as nice swords for the buddy doing all the stealing with me to play with in the woods.
Anywho, they finally got sick of it and had a meeting with the whole house asking who did it, everyone noticed that we'd been distributing a bunch of goodies to them so they fingered us and we had to be rid of these demons that were causing us to steal.
The last time was because I pissed on a Bible, and it ultimately got me kicked out of the group and made them send a notice out to the whole group to pray for me and my afflicting spirits.
Maybe it works for some people, but it didn't work very well for me except to make me try to avoid them.
Quote:The "homosexual demon" exorcism is no longer available on youtube. It was strange to see this evengelical exorcism v. the Catholic exorcism -- the whole attitude surrounding it was so very, very different.
I'm not sure what makes it so different. I'd like to know why I think that. I guess I'll have to ponder it for a while.
I'm not sure if this is the factor but for me a big difference in the varying exorcisms I've seen is the level of violence and aggression. In my cases it wasn't too aggressive other than the smothering of the "laying of hands" but for others it sometimes involved being tied up and being beat. I think some can be very benign (I'd rate mine closer to that end of the spectrum) while some I think should result in the people going to jail.
Quote:Robert, you give me hope that people can overcome the most absurd bullshit that life can dish out.
Well I didn't have it as bad as others who did not get past it.
This girl here was caused great harm by her exorcisms. What they did to her turns my stomach just from the details they were willing to publish, and the things that were not published were a
lot worse.
This is an excerpt from a published transcript (a group of us who document the cult have the original publication scanned and archived
here [PDF]) leading up to the beginning of a series of exorcisms and public beatings she endured:
Quote:49. I have a rod here, will you please bring it to me.. You see this? Pass it to her, let her feel it. I want you to feel this, how heavy it is.
64. … If they have to use a rod to beat him [Satan] out of you, fine, you've got my permission. (Sara: Yes sir I'll do it!) If you've got to slap her to wake her up and get her out of that kind of spirit, slap her! Slap her good! Knock her around! Let her have it! …
74. Now get out, you damn devil, and leave her alone, or I'm going to whack the daylights out of her! (She cries.) Thank God that's the first time I think I've seen tears! Are you sorry? (MB: Yes sir!) But if you're not sorry, I'm going to make you sorry!…
81. You think you're going to make it up there (in the system) somehow? The only way you could make it is to be a whore, that's all! You wouldn't even be an FFer, you wouldn't even be doing it for God, you'd just be doing it for a living. You'd probably end up on drugs " a drug demon possessed, alcoholic, diseased whore and soon dead! Now is that what you want? (MB: No sir!)…
114. The Lord took hold of her head … and yanked it around and back and forth and side ways to side ways by my hands until I was afraid I was going to yank her head off or break her neck! God was so angry... And then I hauled off and slapped her I don't know how many times tonight, hard, right? (MB: Yes sir!) And hit you....
145. … if it takes a good beating up to make you want to get rid of it, then we're going to beat you up!…
183. … if that doesn't work then what can we do? We can't kill you, that's God's business. We'll have to get rid of you.
185. Nobody want's to sleep with you, they're actually afraid of you because you've been under the control of the Devil…
189. I suggest you tie her to the bed.
190. Make sure she goes to the toilet the very last thing. I don't care if you wet the bed, dear, your hands are going to be tied to the sides of that bed at night
194. If beating doesn't get the hell out of you, you're going to get the hell out of here: I want you to memorise that. (MB: If beating you doesn't get the hell out of you, you're going to get the hell out of here!)
199. She's not to be alone at any time from now on. Someone is to be with her at all times who is big and strong and spiritual enough that you just absolutely knock it out of her.
215. If you don't get rid of those demons … you may have to get whipped in bed caned in bed.
This girl had some mental problems to begin with and she has struggled with this stuff for years. I saw her a few years ago, almost 20 years later, after she was released from jail and she's still not ok. She's spent much of the interim on the streets in and out of jail. They told her she'd only be able to be a "whore", and it ended up being a self-fulfilling prophecy (this has been published in Rolling Stone, which is why I can disclose it) and she spent a long time on the streets addicted and supporting herself that way, rejecting any help that came her way that reminded her of her past.
A lot of people unfortunately
don't overcome this kind of thing, and quite frankly I'm not a huge fan of even the more benign stuff because it's only a bit more loony to take these beliefs in demons and possession to a much more dangerous place. They did this to her up to 50 times a day, and I feel it greatly contributed to her subsequent insanity.